The NMH Chess Tournament: A Competitive and Entertaining Experience

By Max Wang ‘25

Photo by Tidane Thiam ‘24

On April 8, 2023, the NMH chess club organized a school-wide chess tournament. There were 28 attendees, including students from different grades and faculty members. The attendees were divided into “beginner,” “intermediate,” and “advanced” groups depending on their skill level.

“I like chess a lot, so I found other people to start a chess club,” said Matt He, ‘24, one of the co-leaders of the NMH chess club. After the chess club played in an outside tournament in January, the leaders of the chess club decided to organize a chess tournament at school. “I think the goal of this tournament is to get people more interested in chess, and maybe get more members in the chess club,” said He.

“I love chess and it’s pretty fun, and it’s cool to see other good players in the campus to compete.” said Channin Zhao, ‘23, an attendee in the intermediate group. “I learned to not be so pressured by time and to think consciously and think ahead,” said Zhao. 

Just as Channing said, time is a challenge for all chess players. In the chess tournament, each player had 10 minutes to think and make strategic moves. If the time is up and the match is not over, they will lose their game. In a competitive chess match, attendees have limited time to think and make moves. Therefore, the players need to think wisely about each move and make quick decisions. 

The club leaders used the Swiss system for the tournament. Every winner gets one point, while every loser receives zero points. People get into new matches based on their current score. When the game ended, the beginner and the advanced group had winners. However, five students were tied for the intermediate group. 

“We decided to first choose a group of people to face off against each other, and after that, the four people will go into a bracket tournament,” said He. Using this method, Keith Limpiyakorn ’23 won from the intermediate category, Keona Burch ‘25 won from the beginner category, and Botai Li ‘24 won the advanced category. Winners from each group chose between one NMH merchandise or a $25 DoorDash gift card for their prizes.

As a world-famous board game, chess requires players to think and use different tactics. The chess tournament brought different levels of chess players to one place and showed the charm of chess to more students in NMH.